Strategy and Fighting the Fewest Battles

Nothing will have a bigger impact on a contractors business over the next decade than putting in a very rigorous process for strategy development and execution.

D. Brown Management Profile Picture
Share

The industry is changing rapidly due to technology, a massive shortage of management talent as well as major trends in project delivery and geographic expansion.  

Leadership Tools: Strategic Planning. A General does not plan how to win every battle; they plan how few battles they need to fight to win the war.

Strategic decisions along with the operating rhythms and the feedback mechanisms that ensure execution are the most highly leveraged decisions in the business. 

This is an area where an experienced 3rd party can add significant value.  Find someone that resonates with your team and has experience relevant to your company.  Change the facilitator every few years for fresh ideas. Unless they are really bad don’t change them every year so you have some continuity.  You might consider overlapping facilitators having the outgoing facilitator sit in on your side of the table providing additional continuity.  

Consider bringing in some of your key customers, vendors and subcontractors as part of your strategic planning process.  Whatever you do; don’t underestimate the value of this process.   

Learn More




Resource - Elevating Construction Superintendents (General Contractors)
Elevating Construction Superintendents by Jason Schroeder is our most recommended book for Superintendents, Project Managers, and Senior Leadership at all GCs along with top leadership at any specialty contractors with a field workforce of 50+ people.
Scoreboards & Scorecards: Talent Development + Business Results
Once someone understands the basics of the task to be done, nothing will improve performance faster than actionable and timely feedback. People align around common scoreboards (think sports) while more detailed scorecards guide decisions and development.
Levels of Design / Development / Detail - Beyond just Design
Contractors can improve business results by applying many of the same processes and vocabulary to their business that the industry is applying to projects. Consider how the different Levels of Detail (LOD) could be applied to your planning processes.